Death and the Walking Stick Book Summary and Study Guide

Detailed plot synopsis reviews of Death and the Walking Stick

Five Star, Jan 2005, 25.95, 262 pp.
ISBN 1410402096

There isn't much violent crime in the Georgia town Ogeechee (pop 3,000) so when octogenarian Althea Boatright runs over Charles Sykes of Jesup, Georgia the police think it is an accident due to poor eyesight, poor motor coordination and her dog sleeping on the gas pedal. They yank her license but don't put her in jail. A few days later Althea is found dead in her home; chief of police Henry Huckabee concludes she fell and hit her head against the bathtub.
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One of Althea's friends feels that she was murdered because the walking stick she always used was nowhere near her body and the one in the house was not owned by the deceased. Police officer Trudy Roundtree listens to the women, especially her boss's mother and concludes they might be right. Althea was not on good terms with her son and daughter-in-law who feel they were cheated in his father's will because he left everything to his wife. Further investigation finds that the car accident might have been homicide; to find the killer requires setting a dangerous trap.

Linda Berry has written a down home cozy that displays life in a small southern town.